Tutors, their courses and some recipes
WE PRIDE OURSELVES ON THE QUALITY OF OUR TUTORS
At the Chef's Room we pride ourselves on delivering the very best teaching. Franco tutors a wide range of Italian themed courses while Lindy teaches more general subjects. They are joined periodically by guest chefs: Malaya born chef Shaun Nean who teaches Asian cooking; Claudine Bulstridge who is of French origin teaches French cuisine, Cardiff based Tina Moss from the Corner House Cookery school takes the Bread of Heaven class.
Fish in a wok
With
Shaun Nean
and Martin Griffiths
Shaun always brings along with him a fascinating selection of Asian ingredients. This coupled with his charismatic charm, his authentic recipes and friendly manner make for a lively and interesting class.
Shaun is accompanied by food writer and photographer Martin Griffiths who takes care of the grass roots of the class and is a stellar back-up teacher.
Shaun's 2012 masterclass was dedicated to cooking fish in a wok, a simple and expedient answer to cooking fish. The success and flavour of the recipes depends very much on the complexity of the spice mixtures in the sauces. Once the sauce is ready the fish is then gently poached in the sauce for a few minutes before serving. This makes for easy entertaining as the sauce can be made in advance and the fish simply added just before serving.
Marinating the fish while the sauce is being prepared adds extra flavour and is a great tip for any kind of fish cooking. Adding olive oil, salt and pepper, a little citrus or few herbs for an hour or so before cooking can enhance the flavour of fish dishes whether being baked fried, grilled or cooked on the barbeque.
We look forward to welcoming Shaun and Martin back to the Chef’s Room next February.
SHAUN'S RECIPES
Fish Curry – serves 4
Ingredients
1-2 whole sea bream or gurnard cut into 3 - 4 cm pieces; the heads can be added for extra flavour
100g ladies fingers (okra)
100g aubergine, cut into wedges
2 tomatoes cut into wedges
1 teaspoon fenugreek (halba)
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
Spice paste ingredients:
2 tablespoons coriander seeds
1 1/2 tablespoons cumin (jintan putih)
8 dried chillies, soaked
4 pips garlic
1 tablespoon tamarind paste
1 litre water
100ml thick coconut milk from 1/2 grated coconut
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
Method
Roast the spice ingredients in a dry wok over medium fire until aromatic. Pound to a fine paste in a mortar and pestle.
Heat the oil in a wok and sauté together the fenugreek and minced garlic until fragrant. Add the spice paste and fry until fragrant, and continue frying until you no longer smell the spices.
Mix tamarind paste with the water and strain this into the wok. Bring to a boil before adding the ladies fingers and Aubergine. Boil until the vegetables are cooked through, 1-2 minutes.
Add the fish, fish heads is using and tomato; gently bring curry to a boil again. Add the coconut milk and season to taste with sugar and salt and reheat without bringing the curry to a boil again.
Cover and leave to stand for ten minutes before serving with noodles or rice
Ikan Tenggiri Assam Pedas – serves 4
Hot and sour Mackerel
This is an unusual and flavourful way of serving mackerel – a wonderful, plentiful and moderately priced fish that is often undervalued. Serve with noodles or rice.
Ingredients
1 kg fish mackerel, cut and sliced into 2cm
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp chilli powder
3 tbsp cooking oil
10 lady's finger
3 tomatoes, quartered
Spice paste, blended
15 dried chillies, soaked and cut into 3cm lengths)
3 tbsp chilli boh (chilli paste)
2 red onions, peeled and sliced
5 pips garlic, peeled
1 tbsp dried shrimp paste
1 cup of water
Ingredients A
3 stalks lemongrass, slightly bruised
5 stalks polygonum leaves/daun kesom
1 stalk touch ginger buds, quartered
5 pieces tamarind skin
80g tamarind paste, mixed with 250ml water
600ml water
4 tbsp sugar to taste
1 tsp salt to taste
Method
Marinate the fish with salt, turmeric and chilli powder. Put aside.
Blend the spice paste with water until fine.
In a frying pot, heat oil over medium heat, sauté the resultant spice paste until fragrant, stirring continuously to prevent from burning.
Once spice paste is fragrant, add in ingredients A.
Simmer over low heat for 10 minutes.
Add in the fish pieces, lady's fingers and tomatoes and gently simmer until the lady’s fingers are tender. Cover and leave to stand for 10 minutes before serving.
Rachel has been helping us out for some time now at the chef's room and has recently created her own workshop; cool cocktails and canapés.
Learn to make a fabulous array of canapés and then enjoy a mini cocktail party before going home.
Create a feast of bite size treats to share at the end of the two hour workshop. Using everyday ingredients you will make luscious lollipops, spicy skewers, savoury sticks, cheesy wings and creamy crostini.
Recipes
HOT KICKIN’ BUFFALO WINGS WITH BLUE CHEESE
Originally from Buffalo, N.Y.
12 chicken wings
6 tbsp Hot Sauce, e.g. Reggae Reggae, Louisiana Hot Mama’s. (Check out your local Deli or most supermarkets have a large range of dark hot sauces.)
1.5 tbsp white wine vinegar
¼ tsp cayenne pepper
1.5 tbsp Worcester Sauce
1 tsp tabasco
2 tsp brown sugar
Seasoned flour
1 tablespoon warm honey for drizzling
For the sauce
Small pot of yoghurt
50 g blue cheese, crumbled (Stilton, Roquefort, etc)
To garnish
1 pack of cress
Method
Mix all of the ingredients (except flour and honey) together in a large bowl. Slash each wing in several places. Coat the wings in seasoned flour, then the sauce. Leave for a few hours or overnight. Cook on an oiled baking tray for 20 minutes at 150 C. After 15 minutes drizzle the chicken wings with honey return to the oven and cook for five more minutes. Serve hot from the oven, garnish with cress and serve sauce on the side
To make the sauce
Take the yogurt and mix with crumbled blue cheese; use Stilton, Roquefort or similar.
Rachel has a keen eye for presentation and has a colourful collection of accessories, platters, glasses and picks for you to choose from to personalize your canapes and to make them look that little bit special as well as tasting delicious.
Tina Moss
Tina Moss from the Corner House Cookery School Cardiff has devised a bread making course specially for us to tie in with our Welsh fusion themes. We call it Bread of Heaven. Learn to make bara brith, bara crai, a traditional loaf, flat breads and focaccia. She has a cool, calm approach to teaching this most theraputic of kitchen crafts.
Bara crai (Lindy Wildsmith)
BARA CRAI – SODA BREAD
500 g white flour
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
250-300 ml buttermilk or skimmed milk
Gently heat the buttermilk in a pan over a low heat. Put the flour in a bowl and add the salt. Stir the bicarbonate of soda into the warmed milk and add gradually to the bowl containing the flour. Mix together quickly making a soft dough, knead lightly and turn out onto a floured board. Shape the dough into a round flat loaf and flatten it with your hands. Put the loaf on a greased hot bakestone or heavy frying pan and bake until the surface begins to harden. Turn and bake on the other side.
Alternatively bake in a hot oven until golden and hard on the outside.
Lindy Wildsmith
Lindy Teaches a broad spectrum of subjects from curing to afternoon tea, from Cambodian to Italian and from puddings to preserves as well as assisting Franco and other chefs.
She has a very relaxed style of teaching fired by much energy and enthusiam for her subject
She has been teaching adult cooking classees since she set up her own cookery club in Herefordshire fifteen years ago. She also teaches at Hart's Barn in Gloucestershire, Divertimenti in the Brompton Road in Knightsbridge and runs residential courses at the WI College, Denman near Abingdon in Oxfordshire and takes one to one and bespoke classes at her home in Herefordshire.
Baking has become very "in" and both her Ritz style 'afternoon tea bake away' and her 'getting ready for Christmas' courses are proving popular.
Chocolate tartlets – makes 24
The pastry needs to be rested for 1 hour, so make it ahead of time. Serve hot or cold.
Pastry
200 g plain flour
20 g corn flour
15 g icing sugar
Pinch of slat
120 g softened butter
1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon of dry vermouth or white wine
Filling
200 g good quality plain chocolate
200g caster sugar
100 g butter
24 g corn flour
3 eggs separated
Vanilla essence or sugar
Equipment
2 x 12 bun trays
Bring all the ingredients for the pastry together and knead quickly into a neat ball, wrap in cling film and refrigerate for 1 hour.
After this resting period, butter the trays. Roll out the pastry on a floured surface, roll 3 mm thick, and using pastry cutters, cut circles measuring 7 cm in diameter and line the bun trays with the pastry. Refrigerate until reuired. Place the cornflour and the egg yolks in a basin and beat until smooth.
Melt the chocolate with the sugar and butter in a basin over a Bain Marie; once the chocolate and butter have belted, stir well and remove the bowl from the Bain-marieadd the beater egg yolks and corn flour and stir again. Whisk the egg whites until stiff and fold into the chocolate mixture. Spoon the mixture carefully into the pastry cases and bake at 180 for 10 - 15 minutes or untilset. (The chocolate filling should be soft in the middle when cooked)
Leve to cool and serve on a large platter dusted with icing sugar.
Franco Taruschio is a legend in his own time. He and his wife Ann created the world famous Walnut Tree Inn which until their retirement ten years ago attracted customers from near and far.
Franco is a great teacher. His chef led classes are dynamic and he enthuses his class into action. There is great fun to be had as well as hard work.
His themes include Italian regional and seasonal food, Welsh Italian fusion and regular fish basics courses.
Franco not only ensures that everyone has plenty to eat he also like to send his class home with something for their "loved ones" something like the following recipe.
AMARETTI MORBIDI – makes 30- 40
300g ground almonds
1 teaspoon almond essence
265g egg white
130g caster sugar
400g caster sugar for coating on a tray. This amount is in excess of what is needed but it is easier to coat the blobs with the sugar. Keep the remaining sugar for next time you make biscuits.
Whisk the egg whites with the sugar until meringue consistency , fold in the almonds and essence.
Using a piping bag with a star nozzle drop walnut size blobs onto the tray of sugar and lightly cover with the sugar. Use 2 forks to do this process so the shape is kept, shaking off any excess sugar. Drop onto a baking sheet covered with baking parchment.
Bake for 10 minutes in an oven preset at 180C.
THESE BISCUITS KEEP WELL IN A BISCUIT JAR FOR AS LONG AS A WEEK IF NOT EATEN BEFORE!
OUR LESSONS BALANCE LEARNING AND CONVIVIALITY
Tutors, their courses and some recipes Statistics: 0 click throughs, 444 views since start of 2012
Tutors, their courses and some recipes
This original illustration was created by artist Deb Clayton as a gift card when she gave one of Shaun's courses as a gift.
COURSE DATES
COURSE DATES
COURSE DATES
May 12 2012 - Franco Taruschio - Welsh Italian Fusion
Potato and laverbread chips
Tagliolini with cockle sauce
Lamb polpette (rissoles) with salsa di papa
Fried bread crumbed Brussels sprouts
Apple cake served with Fior di latte ice cream
Nocelli (walnut biscuits)
JUST A FEW PLACES LEFT
June 9 2012 - Lindy Wildsmith - Barbeque
Cooking a good barbeque meal requires as much skill and expertise as does any other meal.
Summer food to cook indoors or out. Japanese teriyaki-style spareribs- Sicilian lamb cutlets, Spiked tiger prawns, Mango, kiwi and coriander salsa, grilled peppers with balsamico and coriander dressing, Sesame sweet potatoes plus a useful couple of canapes.
June 30th 2012 - Franco Taruschio - Mediterranean
Frittellle di zucchini
Zucchini fritters
Lasagne agli Asparagi
Asparagus lasagne
Quaglie con piselli e crostone
Quail with peas, pancetta and crostone
Crostata con mascarpone e fragole
Mascarpone and strawberry tart
Amaretti morbidi
Soft amaretti
July 14 2012 - Franco Taruschio – Shellfish skills
Nuvolette di vongole
Cockle fritters
Frutti di mare in potacchio
Seafood in potacchio
Tagliolini con granchio
Tagliolini with crab sauce
Torta di mirtilli con frangipane
Blueberry and almond tart
Pignoccate
Almond meringues
July 21 2012 - Lindy Wildsmith – Summer in a bottle, preserving and pickling strawberry balsamic jam, pesto preserve, summer fruits in brandy, Mediterranean vegetables in oil, pickles raspberries.
Plus a cold spread of excellent Welsh charcuterie and cheese with fresh bread and preserves and a glass of fizz.
FULL
September 08 2012 - Franco Taruschio – Pasta
Gamberi croccanti
Prawns fried in a maccaroncini crust
TO TASTE Cappelleti in brodo
Stuffed cappelleti in chicken broth
Tagliatelle con salsa di zucca e noci
Tagliatelle with squash and walnut sauce
Cannelloni di ricotta e prosciutto crudo
Cannelloni with ricotta and prosciutto
Pesche ripiene al forno
Baked stuffed pears
September 29 2012 – Franco Taruschio - Fish basics NEW MENU
the perfect gift for any fish lover
Bruschetta with fresh sardines
Goujonettes of fish with Prik Nam pla sauce
Salmon with cherry tomatoes and olives
Torta di limoncello
Amaretti morbidi
October 6 2012 - Lindy Wildsmith - French farmhouse cooking
Delicious and the original convenience food - rillettes, rillons, confits, with duck, belly pork and rabbit - the classics of French contry cooking make perfect main courses and starters for any occasion.
THURSDAY October 11 2012 - Afternoon tea - bake-away
Learn to make irresistible cakes and pastries to grace the most elegant cake stand. Chocolate éclairs, French macarons, chocolate tartlets and Italian almond biscuits with Lindy. This class starts at 11.30 includes a smoked salmon sandwich with a glass of wine at lunch time and concludes around 3.30 with afternoon tea and a glass of fizz.
"Thanks for a great day yesterday. Quite excited about arranging my first "Dorchester" style afternoon tea very soon. Started thinking about which course I'll try next." Annette Farr"
October 13 2012 - Franco Taruschio – Autumn in le Marche
Olive Ascolane
Olives stuffed with meat and parmesan and deep fried
Insalata di Cachi
Persimmon salad
Vincisgrassi Maceratese
Baked pasta with porcini mushrooms, prosciutto, béchamel and parmesan. 18th Century recipe
Torta di Mele
Apple cake
Torcoletti
Aniseed flavoured biscuits
NEW DATE - DUE TO POPULAR REQUEST
Saturday November 3rd Lindy Wildsmith– Getting ready for Xmas – make your puddings mince pies and cakes to take home
November 10 2012 - Lindy Wildsmith - Smoke gets in your eyes Hot smoking on a domestic hob is a fun and inspirational way of cooking. Make some wonderful dishes to enhance your winter menus. Smoked citrus scented duck breasts, oriental guinea fowl with sesame seed noodles, prawn and scallop skewers A MUST FOR A REALLY ORIGINAL COOKING EXPERIENCE
November 24 2012 - Franco Taruschio - Game for the season
Crostini con funghi misti
Crostini with mixed mushrooms
Tagliatelle con salsa di coniglio
Tagliatelle with rabbit sauce
Fagiano con castagne e cipolle
Pheasant with onions and chestnuts
Turta Tuschesca
Venetian rice pudding tart
Nocelli
Walnut biscuits
December 1 2012 - Lindy Wildsmith - Getting ready for Xmas – make your puddings mince pies and cakes to take home - COURSE FULL - NEW DATE PLEASE REFER TO NOVEMBER 3RD
NEW DATE
December 8 2012 – Christmas work shop - cocktails and canapés – Rachel Howarth
Learn to make a fabulous array of canapés ready for Christmas and all your festive parties ahead. Rachel has concocted a seasonal feast of bite size treats for you to make and enjoy. Using simple ingredients, you will make savoury lollipops, skewers, sticks, wings and crostini. You will also learn to make a couple of sensational cocktails and then enjoy a pukka pre-lunch cocktail party before going home. £60.00 11am – 1.30pm
December 15 2012 - Franco Taruschio – Natale Italian Christmas
Crostini con fegatini di pollo e parmigiano
Crostini with chicken livers and parmesan
Cappelleti in brodo
Stuffed cappelleti in chicken broth
Saltimbocca di Tacchino
Turkey saltimbocca
Patate e parmigiano gratin
Potato and parmesan gratin
Budino di Panettone
Panettone “bread and butter” pudding
Cantuccini
Biscuits
January 2013 – Franco Taruschio - Fish basics
the perfect gift for any fish lover - learn to fillet and cook fish.
Tuna fish crostini
Goujonettes of fish with Prik Nam pla sauce
Sgombri alla Pugliese - cured mackerel in a potato and rocket salaD
Salmon with cherry tomatoes and olives
Torta alle mele – Apple Torte
Rosemary flavoured biscuits
FEBRUARY 2013 Chocolate –
Lindy Wildsmith and Pam Killick of Chocs Away join forces to create a special celebration of chocolate. Cook with Lindy and enjoy an aray of delicious and luscious puddings, cakes and pastries. Then after lunch learn to make and take home a box of handmade chocolates with Pam To include: tempering, moulding, ganache filling and vanilla cream.
FEBRUARY 23rd 2013 – Master of the wok Shaun Nean will be back with another inspirational class, this time on Asian street food. Come prepared to learn about the unusual Asian ingredients Shaun brings with him and to to be charmed by this charismatic guy. To include deep-fried Malaysian Curry Puffs. Malaysian born chef Shaun Nean and food writer Martin Griffiths demonstrate how to use oriental spices and explain the benefits of using fresh spices such as ginger, glanagal and turmeric rather than dried.
Saturday March 2nd 2013
Knife skills - Lindy Wildsmith
the perfect present for the cook who has everything. A knife is the most important tool for any cook. You'll learn how to keep your knives sharp, how to fillet fish, and how to slice, dice, finely chop and julienne all kinds of fruit and vegetables. All of your hard work will be transformed into a delicious meal for your to enjoy at the end of the class along with a glass of wine.
Thai salad with spicy dressing
Cambodian fish and leek curry
Citrus salad
Corporate and team building events and bespoke classes by arrangement
Guest chef tutored courses £90.00 from January 1st 2012
Franco’s and Lindy’s courses £80.00 from January 1st 2012
Saturday cocktail and canapé workshop £60.00
All courses include lunch and a glass of wine and start at 10 am – come for a cup of coffee at 9.45 and finish between 2 and 3 with the exception of afternoon tea that starts at 11.30 (coffee at 11.15) and finishes at 3.30 with afternoon tea and a glass of fizz and cocktail and canapés 11am – 1pm.
More courses and dates to be announced soon.
Visit website link for info on Lindy and her gourmet trips to Italy
Visit website link for cooking holidays in Italy with Franco in le Marche
As well as being an established food writer Lindy Wildsmith is also a saught after cookery teacher. She teaches small groups and one to ones at her home in Herefordshire.
She will be taking a series of 6 classes based on her most recent book Cured at Harts Barn in Gloucestershire.
She also has numerous residential courses coming up at Denman the National WI college near Abingdon and also teaches at Divetimenti in London.
Her most recent book Cured: Jacqui Small 2010 was short listed for both the Andre’ Simon award and the Guild of Food Writers cookery book of the year.
Lindy specialises in British country cooking and preserving and Italian regional food. She lived in Italy for many years and speaks fluent Italian.
HART’S BARN COOKERY SCHOOL - Longhope, Gloucestershire
a course of 6 Curing classes
Saturday 14th January Curing Basics
salting, spicing, drying: bacon, pancetta, sausage and game
Learn the age old craft of dry curing bacon and pancetta, make sausages with chestnuts and black pudding and enjoy a lunch of spiced pheasant with apple and perry.
Saturday 10th March Smoking in your kitchen: salmon trout, duck breast with orange and cinnamon, scallops and prawns skewers and Chinese smoked guinea fowl with noodles.
Saturday 5th May Not raw at all: fun with carpaccio, sashimi. tartare and ceviche
Mouth watering lightly marinated Italian Venetian carpaccio of fillet steak, Japanere sashimi, French tartare of tuna and Equadorian prawn ceviche are dishes revered by gourmets the world over. Exposing meat and fish to heat denatures proteins, we call it cooking. Adding citrus juice, vinegar and wine to meat and fish denatures proteins too but we still call it raw. Enjoy a tasting lunch.
Saturday 7th July Preserves: jam, jelly, chutney and pickle
Learn the basics for all your preserving needs. Make and take home apple chutney, chilli jam, pickled damsons and mint jelly. No lunch is included in this class
Learning to hot smoke opens up a whole new range of flavours for the enthusiastic cook and once you have mastered the craft it will become a habit that you will never give up. Enjoy a tasting lunch
Saturday 8th September French Farm House: rillons, rillettes, confits and crepeinette
Learn to make some of the classic dishes from the French farm house; crepeinette - hand rolled sausages wrapped in caul fat, petit sale’ au lentilles - salted belly pork with lentils, rillettes de canard – potted duck French style and rillons of pork. Enjoy a tasting lunch.
Saturday 10th November The gift of food for Christmas: cranberry relish, festive chutney, gravadlax and potted crab.
What better gift than the gift of food for your very special friends. You might also want to keep them for yourself as many cured dishes are a boon during the festive season as they can be made in advance and then tucked away until needed. Enjoy a tasting lunch and take home some preserves for presents.
DENMAN COLLEGE - Abingdon
Residential courses 2012
Barbeque cooking May 25th – 27th May FULL
Think Barbeque think again! Barbeque meals should be planned like any other informal meal, using a colourful balance of meat, fish vegetables, salad and fruit and served with interesting breads, couscous, rice and noodle and pulse dishes that can be prepared in advance. Whether a fun family affair or a sophisticated al fresco evening with friends, what you don’t want is a pile of burnt offerings.
Learn to make a variety of Mediterranean dips to serve crostini style or with raw vegetables. Make salads enriched with fruit and summer vegetables, herbs and nuts with simple dressings. Lamb kebabs with fennel and garlic, pork spare ribs oriental style, griddled spiced tuna with garlic mayonnaise will all be on the menu.
Farmhouse cooking June 1 – 3
Farmhouse cooking has been the mainstay of rural families, B&Bs and guest houses for generations and has lost none of its popularity – on the contrary it is enjoying a huge revival with the growing interest in British food and the emergence of so many artisan producers and produce.
First things first after breakfast: learn to make the quintessential farmhouse breakfast; still the pride of every rural B&B. Shepherd’s pie, baked ham, potted meat, soda bread, chutney and pickled onions, pork chops in cider and apple tart are all firm country favourites. Make lemonade, ginger beer t or elderflower champagne to quench your summer thirst.
Afternoon tea was a British institution on the verge of extinction until our twenty “somethings“ recently developed a taste for cup cakes, cake stands and pretty china. Now is your chance to make your own delicious scones, Victoria sponge, tea loaf and strawberry jam for your friends and family or a small business venture.
Trattoria Classics 17th – 19th October
Anybody that has been on holiday to Italy will have enjoyed some fabulous informal evenings eating good, honest, simple, food and enjoying the local wine around a table in a Trattoria. Learn to make your own pasta and a rich meat sauce or ragu’ as it is called in Bologna with venison and a vegetable alternative made with pumpkin, walnuts and cheese. Stir up an authentic risotto with seafood. Make pollo grilletato alla romana – a strongly pleasing and aromatic chicken dish with marjoram and white wine and arista di maile al geo - escallops of pork with a marsala and mushroom sauce. There will be caramelised oranges and cantucini biscuits to finish.
Curing 05th 07th November
Curing is a diverse and addictive subject covering a broad spectrum of crafts. You will learn to make Gravalax, - cured salmon with dill; simple, warming and sophisticated confit of duck; smoked duck breast; potted crab; pork rillettes; home cured pancetta; wild boar and hazel nut crepinettes and cured venison and other wonderful winter treats to serve this Christmas.
Festive Italian 05th – 7th December
Learn to make crostini and other finger food to serve with drinks. Make pasta al forno ai tre formaggi – a rich pasta bake with gorgonzola, parmigiano reggiano and mascarpone cheese - a perfect stand-by for Christmas eve or a rich starter to kick off a celebratory meal of roast guinea fowl with char-grilled radicchio. The torta margarita is a fabulous concoction of pan di spagna sponge, langue de chat biscuits, fruit and cream and makes the perfect centrepiece for the festive table. Italian homemade biscuits make wonderful Christmas presents - Learn to make amaretti and almond cakes to give as presents.
Great British Classics 13th – 15th Feb
Make all your favourite dishes to delight your family and friends on this culinary tour of the British Isles; Cullen Skink from Scotland, potted crab from Cornwall with soda bread, the magnificent, beef Wellington and a simple shepherd’s pie, Pork chops in cider, baked jam roly-poly pudding and rhubarb tart will all be on the menu.
Grand Tour of Italy 04th - 07th March
The English “milordi” as they were called progressed down from the Alps through the Italian Peninsular on their grand cultural tours taking in Venice, Bologna, Florence, Rome, Naples and Sicily. Just like the modern tourist these early travellers were enchanted not only by the art and architecture and the scenery but also by the food and drink they encountered. We shall be making cicchetti (finger food from Venice) a rich vegetable and bean soup from Florence, Tortellini from Bologna, Abbacchio all romana, lamb Roman style, sartu’ di riso – a magnificent rice dish from Naples and the cassata siciliana a dainty concoction of ricotta, sponge cake and candid fruits from Sicily and more.